Dev Update - 05.02.2015

Hi everyone,

This week saw the release of the beta test for update 1.1 and we’re receiving some excellent feedback that we’re currently acting on. Thanks to everyone who is playing the beta build and providing feedback and sending in tickets – your assistance is much appreciated! These smaller betas are a more focused effort than the broader scale test phase in the run up to the game’s initial release. To support that we’re providing guidance on what we’d like tested, you can find these in the thread here:

Work on the upcoming Mac release is progressing well and we’re still on track for entering beta by the end of March. This beta period will be significantly longer than that for the updates and we anticipate a period of around six weeks for testing. We still have a whole bunch of optimisation work so we’re not ready to provide a minimum spec yet. It will be available as a 64 bit build only.

As well as a big focus on getting the 1.1 update ready for public release next week some of the team have already been working on the next major update for the game – 1.2 which is due to enter beta in the first week of March. There’s a strong multiplayer focus to this release with the headline feature of Wings. Once the dust settles from the 1.1 release you can expect more details on this and the other features as we progress.

Supplementing the Wings feature we’re also expanding and improving the game such as adding support for assist enabling greater co-operative gameplay. The player comms system will also be undergoing an overhaul to make it more user friendly.

It’s not all about multiplayer though and 1.2 continues our strategy of layering on top of the framework that we have to keep making things better. A simple example of this is adding navigation to the system map, so nav targets can be selected and included in the route planning.

2018 mate.
Anyway, I've almost forget our "Mac friends". Getting the game on Mac to help it's rich users to spend money buying the game seems more important than finishing the game on Windows.
Thx for the news... I'm always waiting every thursday and friday to get news that I never get... But thx

It’s not all about multiplayer though and 1.2 continues our strategy of layering on top of the framework that we have to keep making things better. A simple example of this is adding navigation to the system map, so nav targets can be selected and included in the route planning.

Wait a second, with wings and nav points to the system map is this the gateway to escort and patrol missions? Please say yes.

@Lary, working on a Mac port is a perfectly acceptable thing to do even though the Windows version isn't, as you say, "finished". Games like this are never finished and if they had that attitude it would never make it to Mac, so they might as well do it sooner rather than later.

As for the insinuation its for money reasons, your probably right and thats also perfectly reasonable! 1 they are a business and 2 the more money FD make the more money that will be put into hiring more devs/testers to make the features your so desperate for come sooner and more often

"It’s not all about multiplayer though and 1.2 continues our strategy of layering on top of the framework that we have to keep making things better. A simple example of this is adding navigation to the system map, so nav targets can be selected and included in the route planning."

That sounds very nice.

If you could sex that up by making it part of the Orrey view I'd be pleased as punch. :-)

As for the insinuation its for money reasons, your probably right and thats also perfectly reasonable!

Or perhaps it could simply be because it was a stretch goal in the Kickstarter campaign to have a Mac port within 3 months of release and the level of funding required for that stretch goal was met.

We have announced a stretch goal for a Mac version of the game. If we reach the stretch goal of £1.4 million through the Kickstarter we will release a Mac version approximately 3 months after the Windows PC release.

@Lary, working on a Mac port is a perfectly acceptable thing to do even though the Windows version isn't, as you say, "finished". Games like this are never finished and if they had that attitude it would never make it to Mac, so they might as well do it sooner rather than later.

As for the insinuation its for money reasons, your probably right and thats also perfectly reasonable! 1 they are a business and 2 the more money FD make the more money that will be put into hiring more devs/testers to make the features your so desperate for come sooner and more often

Not that I personally care about the Mac port (I neither own a beret nor write haiku in coffee shops ), but the Mac port was promised for 3 months after the Windows launch during the Kickstarter so that's why it's being worked on now.